Here's we learned from Honourable Christian, the President of Shoe Plaza;

75% of the shoes worn in Nigeria is made in Aba.

There are over 1,000 shops in Shoe Plaza alone with an average of 4 people per shop.

Up to 40,000 footwears are manufactured every week in Aba. “My company alone makes up to 1,000 shoes per week,” he said.

Now, we had no way to verify these numbers, but they couldn't be far off from the truth even if his numbers aren't accurate.

As far as we've seen, a lot seemed to be going on in Aba, but sometimes, this market is its biggest problem.

“People have a problem with Made In Aba products,” I started to ask. “Mostly because it appears that most of the products seem to be counterfeited. Take for example, we know neither Prada or Zara have factories in Aba. But a few minutes walk in this market, and we'll run into shoes with this brands.”

He sat up.

“You see,” he sighed, “we've been trying to educate people that they need to change. But it's a gradual process. We want every shoe that leaves this market to have Made In Aba on it eventually.”

Ambitious, but possible.

What about the China factor though?

“We still have to get raw materials from China,” Christian said. “And another problem we have is equipment. There are some finishings that will be best achieved with equipment. In the absence of that, we have to use hand.”